The Norwegian government said Friday energy company Statoil came up empty-handed when drilling in a frontier prospect near the Helm field in the Norwegian Sea.

The Norwegian Petroleum Directorate said Statoil is finishing drilling operations at wildcat wells, those drilled in an area not previously known to contain oil or gas reserves, about three miles north of the Hyme field.

"The well is classified as dry," the NPD said in a data review.

The company spent more than $790 million on developing the Hyme prospect, getting the project into production ahead of schedule in early 2013.

Statoil estimates the field holds as much as 30 million barrels of oil equivalent. Most of the recoverable reserves exist as oil deposits. The company said the field, discovered in 2009, should be able to produce oil and natural gas past 2020.

NPD said preliminary data from April show an average daily production rate of about 1.9 million barrels of oil, natural gas liquids and condensate.

The oil production is about 5.6 percent above the NPD's prognosis for the month. Natural gas sales were lower because of maintenance work at onshore processing facilities.

Statoil said it spent $355 million on exploration, down from the $433 million spent during the first quarter of 2014. Its equity production increased 4 percent from first quarter 2014 to 2.05 million barrels of oil equivalent per day.